Mending Fences
by LoyaulteMeLie
Summary: Post-ep for 'Divergence'. Malcolm has been restored to his post on board the ship, but there are still issues that need to be addressed.
1. Chapter 1

**Star Trek and all its intellectual property is owned by Paramount. No infringement intended.**

**OCs: Em Gomez borrowed by kind permission of Chrysa, Bernhard Muller by kind permission of Volley.**

**Beta'd by VesperRegina, to whom all due thanks!**

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Author's Note: This story doesn't fit in precisely with 'Expiation', though it would precede it. It's an exploration of an aspect of the aftermath that the episode unfortunately didn't have time to pursue.

* * *

"The Klingon shuttle's requesting permission to dock, Commander." Hoshi looked across at T'Pol.

"Permission granted. Please arrange for a security team to be present when they arrive. I shall await them at the port docking station." The Vulcan slipped gracefully from the Science station; even though she'd been nominally in charge of the ship, she rarely sat in the captain's chair except in moments of crisis. Seconds later she entered the turbo-lift and was lost to view.

The order regarding the security team would normally have been given to the officer seated at the Tactical station, but Malcolm sat mute, carefully giving no sign that he noticed the omission, although he was aware of several covert glances in his direction. He was now the senior officer on the Bridge, and although the command had not been formally turned over to him, the responsibility was in his hands.

He was, indeed, thankful not to have been included in the welcoming party for the returning lost sheep. He knew that a celebration would almost certainly be in order to mark Phlox's safe recovery, though it would probably have to wait for a day or two – apparently the doctor had been subjected to some rather rough treatment at his captors' hands, and would need a little time to rest and recover from his ordeal before he was once again his usual highly-sociable self. And celebrations of any sort would be quite inappropriate anyway until the ship was restored to full capacity and had put a very long distance between her and the limits of Klingon space.

The thought of what ill-usage the kindly Denobulan had been forced to endure among the Klingons sent twin waves of fury and remorse surging through the tactical officer. His own complicity in this was inescapable; if he hadn't delayed the ship, obeying the orders of his old superior in the Section, things might have been very different. Harris had assured him that Phlox would be safe, and that the stability of the Empire was important for Earth's safety; he hadn't been all that concerned about all the lives that Harris said were at risk (the ship's previous encounters with Klingons had never engendered any warmth of feeling towards them), but the old habit of obedience had been too strong. Foolishly, he'd allowed himself to be talked into trusting his old handler and deceiving his present captain, and into a series of actions that could fall under no lesser heading than _treason._

Treason. _For God's sake_. He shut his eyes momentarily, reliving the agony yet again. He must have been stark, staring mad. The shades of generations of loyal Reeds rose up to accuse him. His reasons felt like excuses, and they were nowhere near good enough. The pardon – if not exactly forgiveness – that Captain Archer had finally offered him had only exacerbated his shame; how many men would overlook such a heinous betrayal by one of their most senior officers? He'd looked his commanding officer straight in the face and _lied_. Lied through his teeth, to a man he both liked and respected, fighting to justify his actions even to himself and knowing even then that nothing, _nothing _could possibly do so.

But facing Archer in the Brig afterwards, as excruciating as it had been, was nothing to what it was going to be like facing Phlox.

He watched the readings that told him the Klingon shuttle had docked. Three life-signs came on board: one Human, one Denobulan and one – he frowned – Klingon. The shuttle did not immediately disengage, as he'd expected. Presumably it was waiting for the unexpected visitor to discharge whatever business had necessitated accompanying the captain and the ship's doctor. Hopefully it would only be a brief visit, and the security team was in place; they'd know he'd be relying on them to keep an eye on the situation.

Uneasily he tracked the life-signs with the Klingon among them as far as Sickbay, where they were joined by others – presumably T'Pol, Trip and Captain Hernandez. Then he switched his attention to making a start on organising the Armoury staff's supporting presence on the repair teams.

Only the timely intervention of _Columbia _had saved _Enterprise _from being pulverised by the three attacking battle-cruisers, and the ship had sustained damage that it would take many days to repair fully. The harm to the ship and the injuries suffered by many of the crew were other heavy burdens on his soul; so terribly had he failed to carry out his first and foremost duty, to protect those he'd signed on to serve. The harm he'd done to his relationship with others aboard was of secondary importance, though he felt sorrow and guilt for whatever hurt they'd been caused by his betrayal. Whatever ostracism he might suffer as a result of it was well-earned, and he'd just have to endure it; hopefully their regard for him had never been high enough to give them any serious pain at its loss.

In less threatening circumstances he'd have been down there working on the repairs alongside his staff, but as things stood, he was going to stay at his post and keep an eye on those bloody battle-cruisers. Just having them watching the ship was sending shudders down his spine. Whatever Admiral Krell had told the captain, the tactical officer would remain at his post, vigilant and distrustful, until their business here was concluded and friendly stars streaked past the viewing ports again.

The sooner _Enterprise _was out of here, the better.

* * *

**_One week later_**

Life on board _Enterprise_ had returned to normal, more or less.

Malcolm's fears regarding the Klingons' bad faith had proven groundless, much to his relief. _Enterprise _had been permitted to leave Klingon space unharmed, though two of the battle-cruisers had accompanied her to the perimeter as though seeing her safely off the premises; and thanks to a great deal of very hard work from everyone on board, the worst of the damage had been set to rights. What remained was largely cosmetic, and would be dealt with over the course of time, run in with the scheduled maintenance work that was always part of life on board ship.

His life during the intervening time had been unusually quiet.

It was fortunate for him that he had long experience of coping with solitude. For most of his life he'd been alone most of the time, self-sufficient both by choice and necessity. A circumstance which was proving invaluable, because if he'd been less inured to loneliness he'd be climbing the walls by now.

Tonight, once again, he was alone. All around him other crewmembers talked and laughed over dinner, but he sat at a table in the corner, with only his PADD for company. For all that anyone made any attempt to interact with him, he might just as well have been invisible. His meal lay in front of him, barely touched. He had no appetite; conscious that he needed to keep his strength up, he'd dutifully forked in a couple of mouthfuls, but the taste of it made him ill. He choked down the last morsel of what he'd eaten and gave up. Then he sat silently looking at his PADD, not even seeing it.

The tenor of life during duty shifts meant that people had to speak to him when necessary, even if he was acutely conscious of their varying degrees of discomfort when they did. Only T'Pol seemed to treat him much as she always had; though maybe that was more due to that famous Vulcan self-discipline than any indication of what she actually felt. At a guess, even a Vulcan would have difficulty in coming to terms with such deceit; it was a fair bet that any officer aboard a Vulcan ship who behaved the way he had done would have been dismissed without further discussion.

Travis – bless him – had made efforts to try to act as though nothing had happened. He'd even come and sat beside the pariah in the Mess Hall one lunchtime, and talked about an idea he'd had to improve the targeting scanners' performance. His attempt to sound absolutely normal had been hideously forced, and probably they'd been equally grateful when they had to return to the Bridge for the second half of the shift, effectively putting an end to the discussion. The subject hadn't been reopened.

Hoshi. Malcolm's thoughts shied away from her, as from a wound too deep to be touched. She avoided looking at him, and when she had to speak to him her voice was all but expressionless. He knew that she'd been involved in the discovery of his treachery; it had been all but inevitable that she would be, since her expertise as the ship's linguist would be required in the examination of the Rigelian freighter's 'black box'. He could only hope that what she felt for him was unalloyed contempt, untainted by any guilt on her own account. Unlike himself, she'd done her plain and simple duty. She had nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary, she'd unmasked a traitor.

He'd so far forgotten himself as to develop – and, worse, _reveal _– completely inappropriate feelings for the ship's communications officer. The lion's share of the guilt for what had followed was undoubtedly his; as her senior officer, he should have known better. He _had _known better, but that hadn't stopped him. She must have been absolutely sickened by the discovery of by what manner of scum she'd been duped. No wonder she couldn't bear to look at him. It must be almost more than she could bear to breathe the same air when they had to work opposite one another on the Bridge.

His periods of duty in the Armoury were almost comfortable by comparison. His staff had obviously heard some garbled version of what had happened; the rumour mill aboard _Enterprise _must almost have burst into flames the day the ship's head of security was thrown into his own brig. Bernhard, his beta shift deputy, took refuge in excessive efficiency, leading the rest of the team in trying to almost anticipate his every whim, almost as though they'd found out he was suffering from some terrible fatal disease and they were trying to make his final days as stress-free as possible. Gamma-shift leader Em had stalked into the Armoury when she should have been asleep, and finding him quite alone had yelled at him in Spanish for at least five minutes and then thrown her arms around him and hugged him, regardless of his rigid lack of response. "I do not believe a _word _of this foolishness, _Patrón_!" she'd said, glaring at him. "But whether or not, _I _am not one of those who believe the impossible. _I _do not swing _como una veleta estúpido. _And I will say as much to the _capitán _himself, if he asks me!"

He should have told her the truth himself, in terms not even she could have continued to dispute. But in his weakness, he just couldn't. The fierce flame of her misguided loyalty was warmth in a world that was freezing him to death, and he'd stood silent as she marched back out of the Armoury, unable to do more than hope she didn't actually encounter the captain in the corridors, because in her present mood Archer would be simply incinerated if he so much as looked at her.

He'd have to tell her sooner or later, of course; and preferably very much sooner, because the prospect of a fire-fight breaking out between Captain Archer and an insubordinate ensign was too awful to contemplate. For all his tolerance, the captain had borne just about as much as he could possibly be expected to from his armoury staff. If Em kicked off at him, he'd be all too likely to lash out – particularly after having extended such extraordinary clemency towards the lieutenant who'd injured him so deeply on a personal as well as a professional level. The chances of them coming into contact were fairly remote; Em invariably went down to the Armoury at the end of her shift, checking that all was in order there before handing over to her Alpha shift 'patrón', and thus she would not ordinarily be on the Bridge when the captain arrived there. Nevertheless, there was still a risk that some unlucky chance might bring them together, and Em, furious as a lioness with a wounded cub, would not mince her words if the captain made any reference to what had happened. She would have to be told exactly what the true situation was, for her own safety.

And the captain himself?

There was too much damage there to be put right so easily. Captain Archer's attempts to act as if nothing had happened were almost as painful as Travis's had been. But where Travis had only been bewildered, Malcolm sensed with unerring accuracy that the captain was angry and bitter. God knows he wasn't to blame for that; he was no saint, and only a saint could have taken the blow that Archer had and not felt it. At a guess, the older man was taking refuge in the hope that time would mend the rift. Maybe it would, but his tactical officer was not sanguine that things were ever that simple. It might take rather more than that to put matters right. Nevertheless, for the present the only available solution was to resume his impassive, efficient mask, and become once again the unapproachable, irreproachable English iceberg at the Tactical Station.

That left only Trip.

Moodily, Malcolm stared into the depths of his half-finished tea – which, like his dinner, had gone cold.

Trip had returned from _Columbia_ to carry out a rescue in mind-numbingly dangerous circumstances, and stayed – with Captain Hernandez's blessing – to oversee the repairs to his old ship. His presence here was only temporary, and so far he'd been so taken up with the volume of work needing his attention that he hadn't had time for less important matters like a junior officer who'd so spectacularly blotted an otherwise spotless copybook.

Maybe that was the only reason he hadn't stopped by.

Maybe, on the other hand, he'd heard all he needed to from the captain, and as a friend of Jonathan Archer from way back he'd come to his own decisions.

And who could blame him for that, if he had?

"Hey, Loo-tenant, you don't mind if I sit here?"

The voice – so apposite in the circumstances – almost made Malcolm jump out of his skin. He'd been so lost in his dark reflections that he hadn't heard Trip come in. Just as well he hadn't been eating at the time, or he'd surely have choked.

"Feel free." It wasn't as though there wasn't space. In a crowded Mess Hall, his table was conspicuous as the only one having only one person sitting at it.

Maybe that was why Trip was asking. Hobson's Choice, so to speak.

"I can't believe you had the meatloaf." The chief engineer pointed at the offending meal with his fork as he started on his pasta.

Malcolm shrugged. If a dinner had to be wasted, it had made sense to waste one that very few people were likely to want anyway.

"How are the repairs coming along?" he asked, before the silence could become uncomfortable. If nothing else, it would give Trip something to talk about.

"We're on the far side of the worst of it." Tucker glanced across at him, blue eyes very shrewd. "More'n I could say for some people I know."

"Leave it, Trip." He kept his voice low. There were far too many ears in here, and the scandal was far too recent for interest in it to have waned.

"Aw, you know me. Never could see trouble without wantin' to get in on the act." The American was obviously famished, to judge by the enthusiasm with which he shovelled down the first couple of mouthfuls of pasta, but once his initial hunger was slaked he returned to the subject at hand. Thankfully he kept his voice down too. "I've been hearin' the scuttlebutt around the ship ever since I got back. Want to tell me what really happened?"

"I'd imagine you already know most of it," Reed said shortly. He was growing increasingly concerned in case the captain walked in and found his Chief Engineer in conversation with the ship's renegade. Archer was unlikely to be pleased to find Trip in the role of sympathiser, even nominally.

"I know what's bein' _said _– by a load of folks who probably don't know half the story. I'd sorta like to get the facts straight before I start formin' an opinion." The shrewd blue glance flickered in his direction again. "I went to your cabin late last night, but you weren't there. You weren't in the gym either, so I figured you just didn't want anyone to find you, and I left it at that. But seein' as you're here now, I guess I'll snap a leash on your collar before you can do a runner again."

Malcolm shifted uncomfortably. He knew perfectly well that if Trip had been determined to find him the previous night, the engineer had the means and the authority to do so. The fact was that he'd been holed up in one of the more remote sections of the ship, carrying out a quite unnecessary inspection of one of the Jeffries tubes. It was as good a means as any to be invisible and _incommunicado_, though he'd had his communicator with him and switched on just in case of any emergency. He'd even actually done some inspecting, though it had been desultory at best. Mostly he'd just wanted to hide, Jaguar creeping away into the darkness to lick his wounds. At least there he was free of shocked stares, of curiosity and doubt and even sympathy.

"I was busy," he said at last.

"Yeah, I can guess. Busy bein' invisible."

"I don't have to hide to be that." Try as he might to keep it under control, the bitterness leached into his voice.

"Funny, I can see you just fine." Trip lowered his already quiet voice still further. "It's about time you an' I had a little heart-to-heart, Malcolm."

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	2. Chapter 2

He'd tried to argue, but it hadn't been any use.

He should have known by now that arguing with Trip Tucker was like arguing with a tidal wave. All you got was swamped.

At least the chief engineer had frog-marched him somewhere private for their 'little heart-to-heart' ... it was lucky that the forward observation lounge was empty. Though at a guess even if there had been anyone in there they'd have taken one look at the new arrivals and found pressing reasons to be somewhere else.

"Right." Trip did something to the door control panel and turned around. "We're not gonna be disturbed. Spill the beans, Loo-tenant."

The situation sparked a sudden unnerving sense of being trapped. Malcolm, now leaning against the viewing port, heard his breath come more quickly, as though in panic.

Trip was his friend.

...Wasn't he?

_I have no friends. Friends are people who betray you._

_...Shut up. Shut up and go away and die, you bastard. This is all your fault._

_...Where do you think I came from? Think I just materialized from outer space? Oh, no, you don't get rid of me as easily as that. You didn't invent me. Even the Section didn't invent me. You just let me loose and came along for the ride._

On the other side of the lounge, Trip sat down in an easy chair. He put his feet up on a coffee table, legs comfortably crossed at the ankles, and then folded his arms, giving every indication that he was prepared to wait all night if he had to.

"You do know I can get out if I want to."

"Sure." Tucker nodded amiably. "Go ahead."

Malcolm muttered a particularly venomous Spanish curse that Em had taught him.

"Now there I was, thinkin' Em was a lady."

For all the tactical officer's wrath, that absurd statement dragged a chuckle out of him. "I can't imagine what gave you that idea."

"Crazy, isn't it?" Trip looked across at him levelly. "It ranks right alongside Lieutenant Malcolm Reed bein' a traitor to the ship."

The Englishman's amusement vanished as though it had never existed.

"It happened, Trip. I betrayed the captain and I endangered Phlox. And if it hadn't been for you the ship would have been blown to Kingdom Come, and but for _Columbia_ the Klingons would have taken us apart at Qu'Vat. All through my doing."

"With you aboard."

Reed shrugged. He was the only person on board who would have deserved his sentence.

"I've known you too long, Malcolm. I'm not buyin' into this 'traitor' crap. For one thing, the cap'n would never have put you back in the chair if he believed that. So you must have given him some damn good reasons for what you did, and for the sake of our friendship I'm askin' you to explain it to me as well." Tucker lifted a hand. "That's not blackmail, buddy. You asked me once to believe in you when nobody else would, and I guess this must have been what you were thinkin' of. So you don't have to tell me if you don't want to. But I think it would make things a lot easier if you did ... and maybe for both of us."

Malcolm had stiffened in instinctive rejection as well as in incredulous disgust at what appeared a singularly dirty tactic from a man who'd always come across as honest and honourable. But Trip had a point. Friendship required honesty, and it was a singularly unequal friendship in which the trust was only on one side.

_Trust nobody._

_Go to hell._

But the habit was old in him, and hard to break. Furthermore, so much of what he'd done and been in the service of the Section was classified. Speaking of it was dangerous; at a guess, even Captain Archer had come up short if he'd tried to probe Harris for information.

He sat down, though his body remained upright, stiff with nervous tension.

"I can't... I can't tell you much."

Trip inclined his head. "Fair enough." He waited.

Realising that he was betraying too much with his hands, Malcolm laid them flat along the top of his thighs, feeling the faint damp of sweat even through the thickness of his coverall.

"Before I came on board _Enterprise_, I was ... I worked for an undercover agency. It was Starfleet, but not the 'respectable' end of things." A ghost of a bitter smile; he, who'd epitomised 'respectability', could imagine how impossible it sounded. "Officially, it didn't exist. But I had ... certain 'talents' that made me useful. Weapons, explosives – useful to have an operative who's good at that end of things. And who'll do as he's told without asking inconvenient questions."

"Now _that_ bit I find a mite hard to swallow." A touch of humour, Trip having first-hand experience of his capacity to argue; over the course of the voyage there had been too many arguments to mention, mostly over more power requirements for the Armoury wanted from Engineering and more sense of self-preservation wanted from the Captain.

Malcolm sighed, rubbing his forehead with one hand as he tried to pick his way to what he could safely say. Even from his own point of view, there were truths that needed to be hidden. How could he admit that when he'd come on board _Enterprise _it had felt as though the person he was now was a role, taken on perforce to enable him to function? That for a while he'd felt as real as a cardboard cut-out, mouthing the appropriate lines? Oh, he'd done his job all right. He'd kept that side of the bargain faithfully, as he'd always intended to. He couldn't even have said when it began to dawn on him that his 'act' was becoming more and more natural to him, that his 'lines' were becoming more and more like reactions; that he was beginning to look back on the person he'd been in the Section with shame, and sometimes downright revulsion.

"It was ... exciting. I was young, and they ... things happened." Only in hindsight could he see how he'd been gradually warped into what was required; each step had been so small, so subtle, leading him gently further into hell. "I was someone different. I had to be. That's what they make you." And each consent leads you onwards, makes the next consent that much easier to give, the next and worse job easier to carry out, and finally it's easier not to think or care at all.

"I was part of a small team. We were given … assignments. At first it was … but I got used to it." He drew a deep, shuddering breath; Trip wanted honesty, he should have it. "After a while, I even stopped thinking about it. Whatever it was, whoever it was, it was just a job."

"But somethin' changed."

"Yes. I can't say it was any glorious instant conversion. There was no 'road to Damascus' moment; God knows, I was no saint-in-waiting. Perhaps some of it was boredom, perhaps I just got sick of the payments."

"'Payments'?" queried Trip, obviously thinking that a covert operative specialist was probably a darn sight better paid than a humble Starfleet lieutenant, even one appointed as head of department on the flagship of the Fleet.

"Payments in your head." Malcolm passed his now slightly shaking hand across his face. "When you're on a job, when you're out working, it's fine. Actually it's more than 'fine': it's wonderful. Once you become part of the team, once you trust them and they trust you, it's just pure adrenaline. It's like living in a vid-game, only the weapons are real and you have the power of life and death. And you don't even need a conscience, because you sold that too…. It's just 'get the job done', and nobody cares what you have to do to do it. But afterwards.…"

" 'Equal and opposite reaction'," quoted the other man very softly.

"Oh, yes. Afterwards. Afterwards, you pay. There was one of the team, Pard, she … we used to help each other. But there's only so much another person can do. And sooner or later, you know you'll be alone, with only your thoughts. And then … _then_ you pay." He covered his eyes and shuddered at the memory of how it had been, especially at first, before he'd got used to what he'd had to become. Over the years he'd tried all the palliatives, but ultimately none of them had been enough. They didn't cancel the reckoning. They just delayed it.

"Have you thought about somethin'?" Trip was leaning forward in his chair. "If you weren't a decent man, there wouldn't have _been _any reaction. Okay, when you were on the operation, you didn't care. I'd guess you couldn't _afford_ to care. But afterwards, you knew what you'd done. You knew it wasn't right. There was no one else to punish, so you punished yourself."

"You give me far too much credit, Trip." Jaguar smiled mirthlessly. "Who do you think set the charges? Who do you think pulled the trigger? You want me to tell you I was coerced into doing what I did? I enjoyed it."

"Sure you did. That's why you're out here now nursemaidin' a ship of peaceful exploration. 'Cause you were havin' such a goddamn ball you couldn't bear to give it up." The American pointed an accusing finger. "I've seen you in fire-fights, Malcolm. Give you a target in the Armory to shoot at, and you'll hit it nineteen times out of twenty–"

"Except when I have someone like Jeremiah bloody Hayes looking over my shoulder," muttered Malcolm, but Trip ignored the interruption.

"–but when you aim at someone _alive_, you lose it. You go for the head-shot, sure, but you _always_ _miss._"

"Great. That's made me feel so much better. I shouldn't _be_ missing a target, Trip. The safety of the ship could depend on me hitting it."

"Sometimes, maybe. Sometimes a near miss buys us enough time. But what I'm tryin' to say is, whatever you were then – or thought you were – that's not who you are now. Every time you don't hit a live target you could take out without breakin' sweat, you're sayin' _that's not who I am._ What I can't get my head round is why you couldn't trust the cap'n to help you out when … whatever happened, happened. Hell, Malcolm, you know he'd protect you from anythin'."

"Do you think I don't know that?" The tactical officer sprang from his chair as though the seat had just been electrified, and wheeled back towards the wall. "Do you think I wanted this to happen? I received a transmission. From … from the handler who used to control my team. He didn't tell me much – that's not how it works – but he said Phlox would be safe as long as I delayed the ship long enough for the Klingons to make a clean getaway from the freighter with him. I wanted to tell the captain. I practically begged to be allowed to tell him. But I wasn't allowed to. They said he was too close to Starfleet, that he'd have to pass on whatever information I gave him, and that would spoil everything."

"Guess they don't know the cap'n too well."

"I don't know." Malcolm leaned against the viewing port again, looking out wearily at the streaking stars outside. "He's a Starfleet officer. He's under orders. I thought he would play along if I asked him, if I explained, but I couldn't be sure. Especially when we found everyone on board the freighter had been killed; as far as I knew, that wasn't supposed to happen. And if he didn't – I'd have had Phlox's death on my conscience."

"You have explained all this to Phlox."

Silence.

"Malcolm. Tell me you've been down to Sickbay and talked to him."

Silence.

"So I guess you haven't talked to Hoshi either."

"Hoshi doesn't want me to talk to her."

"She tell you that?"

"She didn't have to."

"Geez. Will someone tell me how a guy who dated half the girls in San Francisco got to be so dumb about women?" Trip had risen in his turn, and now stood, hands on hips, directing a multi-megawatt glare across the lounge. "That woman damn near broke her heart when she had to shop you to the cap'n. And ever since she's been convinced you hate her guts for what she did. I guess the only thing that's lettin' her hold things together is tryin' to believe the scuttlebutt, but if she does that, where does that leave Jon? A starship captain who's such a goddamn fool he'll keep on a traitor at his tactical station?"

"She won't even look at me," muttered Malcolm. He'd rather hoped that Trip was unaware of the situation between himself and Hoshi, but given the fact that the chief engineer was often inconveniently observant and, worse, extremely intuitive, trying to keep him in the dark forever had always been rather a forlorn hope.

"Nope. Given the way she feels right now, I'd guess she doesn't really want to find herself starin' down the business end of a pair of phase cannons when she's on duty. As for the rest of the time, she probably thinks if you cared, you'd go find her and explain yourself."

Despite Malcolm's best efforts, a tiny, frail green shoot of hope appeared in the desert of his despair. In his mind's eye he assigned it a set of coordinates and modified the targeting scanner settings to blast it out of existence, but though his fingers hovered over the firing button he just couldn't summon up the will to press it.

"But first," said Trip inexorably, "you're goin' down to Sickbay and you're goin' to tell Phlox exactly what you've told me."

The Englishman laid a hand carefully against the transparent aluminium of the viewing port and thought how few millimetres separated his flesh from the annihilating cold of the hard vacuum outside. "Phlox … already knows some of it." He paused. "After that time in Shuttlepod One, I … I know neither of us were coping. But I was at a – a stage where I couldn't handle the problems, couldn't handle not being _able_ to cope. And I was on the verge of … reverting."

"As a copin' mechanism."

"Something like that. I wanted to stop caring, but I … you couldn't have the person I was aboard a starship. You just couldn't." He watched his hand clench slowly into a fist and then flatten out again. "So I asked Phlox for help. And of course that involved telling him … some of the truth."

"About as much as you've told me."

"Pretty well. Trip, this is _dangerous._ You think I've covered all this up because of some insane bloody vanity? Just because I don't want anyone knowing about my unsavoury past? They don't want people knowing _anything _about what goes on. I'm putting you in danger now, talking about it at all. I told Phlox under the protection of doctor-patient confidentiality, and I stopped him from taking notes when I did it, because there isn't a damn thing that's recorded in this ship that the … they can't get access to. Yes, and that includes the captain's logs as well. You know those late-night strolls I take around the ship? I know what I'm looking for, yes, and I've found them as well. After our last visit to Jupiter Station there were four. Three were pretty obvious, the fourth was a bit sneaky."

Evidently alarmed by this information, Tucker glanced around the lounge. "You don't think…"

"Oh, there aren't any in here." A hard smile. "Not any more."

"But won't they know…?"

"That I found them? I'd imagine so. I doubt they'd think I'd forget my training that quickly."

"But they won't…" The American shook his head. "No. They couldn't get anyone on board _Enterprise._"

"They got me."

"So you think there could be _others?_"

"Operatives, you mean? Possibly, but I doubt it. I know where to look for them too. One of the MACOs who came aboard when we were hunting the Xindi didn't quite have the unblemished history she claimed." He showed his teeth. "We came to an understanding."

Trip's blue eyes were wide with amazement. "Did Hayes know?"

"Know? I doubt it. Suspect, maybe. Not much got past Hayes. At a guess if he'd have had more than suspicion he'd have got rid of her, but maybe he kept her because she was good at her job. And there aren't many houses that don't have at least one rat in the basement." He shrugged. "Figuratively speaking."

"So Phlox already knows some of this." The chief engineer waved away the change of subject, and returned to the one that really mattered. "Now I really don't understand why you won't go down and talk to him. Hell, Malcolm, you owe him that much. And if he knows why you did what you did, I'd guess he'll be a lot more forgivin' about it than the cap'n was."

"It went wrong." He almost whispered the words. "He wasn't supposed to get hurt. If I'd done what I should have done – if I'd told the captain at once – we could have caught that freighter, we could have saved the people on board it and saved Phlox as well. But I just … caved. I did what I was told like a good little operative, like the sleeper they'd turned me into without me even knowing. And it wasn't till I was looking straight into Captain Archer's face and lying to him that I realised what I was."

"I know what you were," said Trip bluntly. "You were a good man put in an impossible situation. Sure, you made the wrong call. Maybe you should have done differently, maybe you should have told the cap'n, but you did what you'd been conditioned to do: you obeyed orders. And then what did you do? You took the payment. From what I've heard, you practically walked into the Ready Room with a placard round your neck sayin' 'I Did It.'"

A soft huff of a laugh. "Something like that. By my old team's standards, I actually walked in with a placard _and _a megaphone, just in case the captain suddenly developed dyslexia."

"Damn right you did. But now you've got to get yourself through the other half of the minefield. Malcolm, you have to talk to Phlox, and then you have to talk to Hoshi. Hell, you walked out to tackle that Romulan mine on the hull without even breakin' sweat. This is just more of the same, if you want to look at it that way."

"Oh, no. I wish it was that simple." He sighed. "Caitlin summed it up once. She said, 'Malcolm, relationships are about curves. Your problem is that you only think in straight lines. That's why you hit anything you aim at but all you do with people is ricochet off them.'"

"Seemed to me you weren't doin' that badly matchin' Hoshi's trajectory a while back," said Trip innocently.

The green shoot had put out two hopeful leaves while his attention was diverted. He glared at them. And at Trip too, for wantonly and irresponsibly watering it.

"Right. I've just explained to you how dangerous it is me telling _anyone _about all this, and the first thing you want me to do is endanger at least two other people besides yourself. Captain Archer may have a high enough profile to be fairly safe, and notice I said 'fairly'. But I took precautions before I spoke to Phlox, I've spoken to you under duress, and what the hell excuse would you like me to use for endangering Hoshi?"

The American folded his arms in the way that invariably signalled he was going to be annoying. "So you still see her as a scared little green girl, out of her depth. Someone you have to protect from everythin' – includin' the truth."

"Don't be ridiculous," growled Malcolm. He had the best of reasons to know that Hoshi Sato was no 'scared little green girl', and she might have been out of her depth when she'd first come on board but over the years of the mission she'd grown into one of the strongest women on the ship. That was one of the things he loved about her the most.

One of Trip's eyebrows went up in a move he could have learned straight from T'Pol. "So your reason for _not _puttin' her in the picture is…?"

"Her _safety,_ you idiot!" He pushed off from the wall. "If it's a choice between me bringing her into danger by trying to salvage what's left of her respect for me, or me ensuring her safety by leaving her in the dark, as far as I'm concerned that _is _no choice. I can live with her thinking the worst of me, as long as she's safe. That's all that matters. More than anything else, more than anyone else. If you must know, I love her so much I'd rather she hated me for the rest of her life than put her in a moment's danger. And that's final."

"Not quite, Malcolm." A third voice made him jump like a scalded cat, and he spun around to see Hoshi rising from the corner where she'd been hidden by a conveniently situated easy-chair. "I think I'm entitled to make my own decisions on this one."


	3. Chapter 3

"Guess you two need me here like Egypt needed the Ten Plagues," murmured Trip, and with a flamboyant gesture towards the stunned tactical officer – who, had he been less shocked by events, would certainly have responded with a gesture of his own – he beat a swift and tactful retreat.

"I'll kill him," Malcolm finally managed to articulate. "Did he know you were there?" _Stupid question_, he thought, even as he asked it.

"Of course he did," Hoshi said as she crossed the space of floor that separated them. "He's a good friend to you, Malcolm. As a matter of fact, they don't come any better."

"I'll make my own judgement on that score!" the Englishman responded furiously. "Didn't you _understand_ what I've been saying? How _dangerous_ this is?"

"So dangerous Trip was entitled to take the risk and I wasn't?" She'd come to a halt in front of him, her arms crossed, and the glint in her eye said he was on extremely chancy territory. "Malcolm, how _dared _you make that decision for me? Is that all what we had was worth to you? Okay, I can get why you couldn't tell me anything at first, but afterwards, you could have trusted me. You _should _have trusted me. And now I find out that it's all Malcolm Reed being stupid and chivalrous and protective! Oh, I could kick your butt, Malcolm! I thought we'd got past this 'the female is the weaker of the species' crap centuries ago!"

"The female – meaning you – was never trained the way I was," he all but spat. "I don't want you put in danger for my sake. I don't–" but the rest of what he'd intended to say was cut off abruptly when she lunged forward, threw her arms around his neck and kissed him passionately.

He made one or two well-meaning attempts to speak, but it's not easy when your mouth is full of your beloved's tongue and your body's registering some simply delightful areas of localised pressure. Not to mention responding with some localised pressure of its own, which his hands (acting entirely on their own initiative) grasped Hoshi's exquisite bum to make her particularly aware of, in just in case she wasn't already. Though her grip on his own backside suggested she'd already noticed that particular development and was making the most of it.

With an effort, he pulled his face away. "Don't think you can shut me up with–" A protest that ended on a strangled gasp as she found a comprehensively effective way to shut him up. All that emerged after that were a few moans, except that he managed to salvage enough of his thought processes and physical co-ordination to make her mew a bit in her turn.

"Hoshi Sato, if we don't stop this right now I am going to throw you down and shag the life out of you across the nearest horizontal surface, and once I get started I won't care if every crewman on the ship walks in and catches us," he groaned.

"I think you're in enough trouble with the captain already," she said, with a smile up at him that was half way between sympathy and teasing. "So I'll tell you what we'll do. I'll leave here and go to my cabin, I'll have a shower and I'll get into bed _completely naked._ And when you've finished what you've got to do, I'll expect to see you there. In the same condition, of course."

"I've already showered–" But of course she'd already know that. He wouldn't have got changed into what he was wearing until he had. So she was talking about something else altogether: something that she and Trip were cramming him at like a pair of riders stubbornly steering a recalcitrant horse towards a fence it refuses to jump.

Her fingers touched his lips gently. "It won't be as bad as you think."

He kissed her hand wordlessly. It would be bad enough. But he knew that the longer one refuses to confront a fear, the more terrifying it becomes. It was time he faced his final ordeal.

And if Hoshi had forgiven him – if she'd heard his confession and still loved him, which was a thing he'd never so much as dared to hope for – then he didn't want to return to her bed unshriven. He would be starting their relationship afresh, on a new, clean footing, shot of all the secrecy and shame he'd borne for so long. That, he knew, was what she intended, and he loved her for her greatness of heart and clarity of vision.

He even loved Trip for much the same reasons, even if he did want to kick him all round the ship next time they met up.

Fortunately the prospect of yet another visit to Sickbay had been sufficient to quell the disturbance in the more southerly areas of his clothing. He'd be able to walk out of here without scaring the horses, not to mention those crewmembers of a more nervous disposition.

"I love you, Hoshi," he said softly, releasing her. "I never meant to hurt you…"

"Hush." She laid her hand gently across his mouth. "Not tonight. Tonight, let's just … find each other again."

He nodded. There would still have to be talking done; too many wounds had been inflicted to be healed so easily and with so little ceremony, but he was sure that within the confines of her bed they would take the first and most important step towards reconciliation.

First, however, he had a duty to perform.

And he wasn't going to put it off any longer.


	4. Chapter 4

The double doors of Sickbay were in front of him all too soon.

There was someone inside; he caught the sound of voices.

"…No trouble at all, Ensign."

A sound of boots hitting the floor announced that whoever had been visiting had hopped down off a bio-bed, and moments later the door hissed open and Travis came out.

The young helmsman's eyes brightened automatically before remembrance cast a shadow across them. "Oh, hi, Malcolm…" He trailed off uncertainly. When they were off-duty first names had been in order for a long time, but things had changed too much for him to be confident of the status quo.

"Nothing too bad, I hope?" Malcolm tried to hit a note between professional concern and friendly curiosity, and thought he'd succeeded fairly well.

"No, just a bit of a pulled shoulder from my last workout in the gym. Teach me not to skimp on my warm-ups next time." Travis grimaced, and then went on a little diffidently, "See you there later on?"

"I doubt it. I think I'll be catching an early night. Maybe another time."

"Sure." The ensign's smile in return was a little more relaxed; his relief was palpable. Possibly it was because he hadn't relished sharing the gym with a pariah, but Malcolm suspected the real reason was that Travis simply hated disagreements on board ship. Any indication that things were even beginning to return to normal would be welcome in the young man's world. Besides which, he had almost unlimited faith in Captain Archer's wisdom. If the captain had restored Malcolm to his post, then that was good enough for Travis. He might wonder what had happened (he would be other than human if he didn't), but he would be willing to accept his commanding officer's verdict, and only anxious thereafter to smooth things over.

Malcolm nodded towards the doors and grimaced in his turn. Travis gave him a big sympathetic grin and walked away, probably not even realising that this would be the hardest visit to Sickbay that its most reluctant patient had ever imagined or endured.

Moments later, the corridor was empty. He heard Phlox inside his domain, clucking over some misdemeanour in the menagerie.

_Waiting only makes it worse…_

As the doors hissed open again the doctor looked up in mild surprise, obviously expecting it to be Travis returned for something he'd forgotten to mention. When the Denobulan saw who it actually was, his face stilled. The marks of the treatment he'd received in captivity were still visible on it. His expression wasn't hostile, but it was extremely curious. The sort of curiosity that could, however, easily explode into _'Well, what sort of treacherous little shit do we have here, then?'_

Hours of desperate thought had resulted in some kind of awkward speech of apology being ready on Malcolm's tongue. Now that the moment to deliver it was actually here, however, the words dried in his throat. For an instant he stared blankly at the man whom he'd failed so catastrophically, and then instincts that went back centuries to his distant Royalist ancestors took over. As fluidly as if he'd rehearsed the movement for hours in front of a mirror, he dropped to one knee and bowed his head.

Phlox uttered a kind of startled snort, and then bustled over and took hold of his upper arms, trying to lift him. "Mister Reed, what _do_ you think you're doing?"

"I'm showing you my contrition," answered the Englishman, refusing to be lifted a centimetre. "I'm showing you how I feel about what happened. And don't tell me I don't need to. I know what I did."

"I know a great deal about what you did, Lieutenant." The doctor's tone was complex, full of shadows. After a moment's pause he let go of his visitor, but then to Malcolm's surprise he stepped back and sat down cross-legged on the floor, so that their eyes were pretty well on a level.

"I hope you'll excuse me not kneeling," Phlox went on conversationally, "but if you insist on us having a conversation at this proximity to the floor, this position is the most comfortable for the average Denobulan."

Reed flushed, suspecting mockery, but his gaze found no trace of it in the doctor's face.

"I take it this is some kind of English custom. I hadn't read about it in the Starfleet database," added the other man, with every indication that he'd unearthed yet another intriguing facet of human interaction to be added to his ever-burgeoning papers. His tone, however, was now kindly.

"Well … it's not common nowadays," said Malcolm a little stiffly. "But in the circumstances, I think it's appropriate."

"So you think it's appropriate towards me. Because you delayed _Enterprise_ and allowed the Klingons to make their escape with me."

Flushing even more at the calm recital of his crime, the lieutenant nodded. "It was unforgivable." He swallowed, and came out with what he meant to say. "But if my resignation would make you any amends, I'll… I'll go to the captain immediately."

Phlox ruminated for a while.

"I will say, it wasn't the most comfortable experience I've ever had," he said at last, thoughtfully. "And I won't say I wasn't somewhat concerned for my own safety. But then, I knew that _Enterprise_ would be in hot pursuit. I had every confidence in every man and woman aboard her. Particularly," he added gently, "a certain tactical officer who has always done everything possible to ensure the safety of everyone in his care."

"But not this time." The lump of shame in Malcolm's throat was almost choking him by now, but he kept his head up, ready to accept the denunciation to come without flinching.

"You lied to the captain." The Denobulan's voice was now very soft indeed. "Would you mind telling me why?"

"Because I … I had orders. I told you once … about the Section. My old controller – contacted me on board ship, told me …. Told me I had to lie." He could come out with excuses, explain how he'd tried to save himself from his fate, but what would that achieve? In the end he'd done meekly as he was told, like the spineless coward his father had always thought him. And that, at the bottom line, was all that mattered.

"And did he tell you why you had to lie?"

"Because there was something going on … something the Klingons needed you for." _He said you'd be safe if I co-operated. But you so nearly weren't. And if you hadn't been he wouldn't have cared, as long as the bloody deal he'd fixed up went through. _

"Did he explain the seriousness of the situation for the stability of the Klingon Empire? And that my safety had been guaranteed?"

"Something about it," Reed said grudgingly, as the blue gaze opposite him opened his reticence like a flensing knife. "Personally I'd have thought we'd all be safer if the Klingons were busy fighting each other, but that's not my decision."

"So." The doctor sat back. "You therefore lied to the captain to safeguard me."

It was the absolute truth, but the tactical officer hadn't heard it expressed quite that bluntly before. And it wouldn't do _at all. _"I _lied _to my _commanding officer,_" he said emphatically, in case Phlox had somehow missed the significance of the words.

"Oh, yes." The other man nodded. "I believe that Humans have an expression, 'Greater love has no man than to give up his life for his friends'. You, on the other hand, gave up something you value even more than your life. You gave up your _honor_."

"I…"

"Therefore, Lieutenant, I emphatically refuse to forgive you for the greatest gesture of friendship I have ever received. And if you do not stand up immediately, I shall inform the captain that you have contracted a severe dose of the first serious disease I can think of that will entitle me to confine you to Sickbay for a fortnight."

Appalled by the prospect, Malcolm scrambled to his feet. "But…"

"Not a word, Mister Reed." Phlox held up a forbidding forefinger. "Except two that _I _should say to _you. _And those are 'Thank you.'"

He opened his mouth to protest.

"Or I could make it three weeks, if the disease is serious enough," added the doctor.

Three weeks, confined to Sickbay! Cowed into abject submission, he tamely accepted the outstretched hand, and shook it. He knew that Denobulans were uncomfortable with casual physical contact, and realised that the gesture was a privilege in itself.

"I'm sure I'll be seeing you again soon, Lieutenant." The breezy voice followed him out into the corridor, where he found himself moments later without quite understanding how he'd got there.

"Not if I can help it," he muttered, old habits reasserting themselves.

"Four weeks is my last offer!"

The distant sound of Denobulan chuckles followed him as he fled.

**The End.**


End file.
